Table 2 Clear Cases: Patients who had tried to end their pregnancy on their own
From: Health care provider reporting practices related to self-managed abortion
Presentation | Specific cases | Composite cases |
|---|---|---|
Injury/ trauma | “a patient asked her boyfriend to punch her in the stomach” | |
Medication abortion | Person presented in ED “septic from an incomplete abortion.” Disclosed had taken abortion medication her cousin had mailed to her from Caribbean | Multiple patients had obtained misoprostol online or “gone to Mexico to retrieve it” |
Homeopathic | Came into abortion clinic because homeopathic substances didn’t work | |
Alcohol/ drugs | Tried in 1st & 2nd trimester to “induce a miscarriage with alcohol and drugs, and then it didn’t work.” Decided to continue pregnancy. Disclosed when presented in [obstetrics] triage because concerned about effects on baby. | |
Patient admitted for substance use disorder treatment in 2nd trimester; as part of [obstetrics] history, mentioned that had tried to “stop [a previous] pregnancy by…taking too much alcohol” | ||
Patient “on opioids” entering prenatal care who “did not want to be pregnant” had tried to take a [benzo] to try to “stop the pregnancy” | ||
Patient with an opioid use disorder who also used crack/cocaine who tried to induce early labor by using additional cocaine & “actually succeeded” |